As you may or may not know, Italian restaurants are everywhere in Japan, especially in urban areas.

Chiba prefecture, where I live, is no exception. There are different kinds of restaurants ranging from chain restaurants to small, privately owned ones to large, fancy ones. Among them, my favorite one is outstanding. The restaurant, or rather ristorante, is small and homey, with lovely displays of Italian folk art and wine bottles, and Italian music playing in the background. Their dishes are, of course, wonderful and very authentic. You can easily imagine how much I love everything about the place. It feels every single element in the place is all blending together to create the special atmosphere of the lovely space.

And there is one more thing that makes this place so special — the owner. The ristorante is run by an Italian owner. He is in his fifties, according to him, and opened the ristorante here after he moved to Japan with his wife and daughter several years ago. So why is this owner so special to me? Well, the answer is quite simple. When you walk into the small lovely space, everything around you changes like magic. It's like opening Doraemon's Anywhere Door and instantly teleporting to another world, if you know what I mean. You feel as if you were walking along and suddenly wandered into Italy. The air, the atmosphere, and everything feels so different from what you would usually experience here in Japan.

I guess for most people it’s not hard to imagine how Japan and Italy are different from each other in many ways. I often think about what it would be like if I ran a store in a foreign country, and I guess I would be just so busy adjusting to fit into the new environment that I would forget or give up trying to be myself. And I think that must be boring and a bit dissapointing for someone who is expecting something exotic and authentic from my place. I hear him humming and whistling to the music while I'm waiting for my plate to be dilivered to me. Here, no one gets irritated or angry if the food takes longer to come out. This is because everyone enjoys not only the food, but being in the space itself.

Today I went to this place again to enjoy the delicious food and wine, and most importantly, the joyful mood broght by the owner. After lunch, I had gelato for dessert. It was decorated with small, fresh baby kiwis that were brought as a small gift by one of his regulars. For some reason, I have been feeling down lately, but now I feel recharged.